Trimess

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

First there is CYBER STALKING, now there is CYBER SQUATTING

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SCChdUtw9XI/TgGWXmHxt7I/AAAAAAAAAGM/ShG6-2czNPc/s1600/TradeMarkLetter+001.jpg

2 comments:

Jeff Welch said...

Deny or ignore their request. Unless you're profiting from the use of the name, they haven't got a leg to stand on - and they know it.

Jeff Welch said...

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anticybersquatting_Consumer_Protection_Act#Overview_of_the_ACPA

"The ACPA does not prevent the fair use of trademarks or any use protected by the First Amendment, which includes gripe sites.[12] In Mayflower Transit, L.L.C. v. Prince, 314 F. Supp. 2d 362 (D.N.J 2004), the court found that the first two prongs of Mayflower's ACPA claim were easily met because (1) their registered trademark was distinctive and (2) Defendant’s “mayflowervanline.com” was confusingly similar to Plaintiff’s Mayflower trademark.[13] However, when the court was examining the third prong of Plaintiff’s ACPA claim, whether Defendant registered its domain name with the bad faith intent to profit from Plaintiff, the court found Defendant had a bona fide noncommercial use of the mark, therefore, the ACPA claimed failed.[14] “Defendant’s motive for registering the disputed domain names was to express his customer dissatisfaction through the medium of the Internet.”

In short - no profit (or plan to profit), then no violation of the ACPA. "Gripe sites" (see the Wikipedia entry) are specificually protected under the First Amendment, and this right supercedes any entity laying claim to any disputed domains so long as the registrant has only noncommercial intent.

In short - that attorney is wholly full of shit, and I'd either ignore them or invite them to proceed to spend member money to lose their case in court.

If I were an active member, I'd be demanding that the union spend its money on an attorney that didn't get their JD out of a Cracker Jack (tm) box.

-jw